Android 4.4 KitKat to run "comfortably" on 512MB RAM devices, here's how

The mere mention of Android 4.4 KitKat is getting dangerously close to inflicting a sense of deja vu, as day after day the new Google OS has been making headlines and going through the press like little else. And while there is a number of new features worth talking about, and even dissecting, the supposed memory optimizations that come with Android 4.4 are what's really buzzing. And it's no wonder, seeing as Google's head of Android, Sundar Pichai, promises that KitKat “can run comfortably on the 512MB of RAM devices that are popular in much of the world”. This is pretty important for the platform, as it means that Google may finally have the answer to what's referred to as 'fragmentation', or in other words: it may finally have the weapon to kill off the Gingerbread man.

All fine and dandy, but how?

Simple: with Project Svelte, the immediate successor of Project Butter that came with Jelly Bean with a similar aim, though far less concerned with the performance of truly low-end devices.

But exactly what is Project Svelte? Well, for starters, Google has decoupled the Android core from the so-called Google Experience, and it's made both of these lighter. Android's memory footprint has been slimmed down by removing unessential background services and, simultaneously, the memory consumption of features that you can't really live without has been reduced. Moreover, the wide array of Google services, such as YouTube and Chrome, have also undergone a similar treatment, and should now prove just as powerful, but more slender. Further still, core system processes will now protect system memory from apps far more jealously, especially if those consume large amounts of RAM. And last, but not least, Android will now launch multiple services sequentially, instead of at once, with the aim of trimming peak memory demands, thus improving stability.

Still on the topic of optimizations, it's worth pointing out that Google won't be approaching this rather complex issue on its own, isntead, it's enlisting the help of manufacturers and developers both. To do so, Google has introduced a number of tools that will help the next gen of devices take advantage of optimizations such as zRAM swapping, kernel samepage merging and the ability to tune the cache of the Dalvik JIT code. Other tools include a new API that will allow developers to make their apps really flexible, by letting them tweak or completely disable high memory features, depending on the specific device, and it's relative memory. Additionally, devs will be able to take advantage of the new procstats and meminfo tools, along with a more widely supported RenderScript Compute (GPU accelaration), which has also seen some performance gains with Android 4.4 KitKat. According to the head Android engineer, Hiroshi Lockheimer, Google's OEM partners have already gotten a heads-up about the changes:

“We have briefed all of our manufacturing partners on this and they are all very excited about it," says Lockheimer. "They all want to ship the latest thing. It is not like they wanted to ship Gingerbread but they had to because that is what fit.”

This means that...

KitKat may very well put an end to the Gingerbread menace

Having passed the 1 billion users milestone, Google is now obviously gearing for “the next 1 billion users”, or so a Google blogpost by Pichai would lead us to believe. Seeing as the high-end is becoming increasingly saturated, and Google is already accounting for giant piece of it, it's only natural that the company focuses its engineering efforts on solving a long-standing problem: most entry-level devices can't properly run anything past Android 2.3 Gingerbread, a 3-year old OS. That's a pretty significant problem for Google, developers and OEMs all, with the former two looking to extend the reach of their latest services, and the latter simply trying to build more compelling products. According to Google's latest numbers, a little over 26% of all Android devices are still stuck on Gingerbread. That's over a quarter of a billion. Yikes!

Of course, whether Google actually manages to put an end to the Ginger man still remains to be seen, but we suspect that low-end devices touting the latest and greatest Android are still months away. Moreover, it'll be a few more years for existing devices to completely die out, as these are quite unlikely to receive a leapfrog update to KitKat. And yet we don't particularly see this as any less of an achievement (provided it delivers), and at least one key industry player is already gunning for the increasingly important lower end market.

This, above all, is the alleged Google dream – Android everywhere. It's hard to say whether that isn't ultimately a bad thing, but one thing is for certain – we're getting ever closer to having adequate and full-fledged smartphone experience at a fraction of the cost from just two years ago. And that's awesome.

So optimisation is copying too lol come on, it's common sense to optimise software over time, no software stays the same forever, it's the natural progress of going forward. Is Android suppose to stay heavy and not try and make things more efficient?

False. The WP8 doesn't even do a quarter of what Android can do. Good luck with your live wallpapers, toggle switches, multitasking, multiple open windows, smart actions, oh wait. You don't any of that and more...

You have live tiles? Which is basically just a fancy menu that does the same thing as your app list. With a couple pictures or the weather.

The point is the OS has nothing amazing to do. Even though the $40 android phones are sometimes a little laggy, they are still doing more than the future 929. No brainer they are going to be slower with low end specs. At least the OS has focused on its high end phones always. Instead of the low end WP8 phones and leaving the high end WP8 phones with the same experience as its $100 phone.

You decide. Its either crappy features on the low end phones and high end phones with WP8 in order to run "smoothly".

Or have high end features that run "ok" on low end phones that are intended for high end phones with Android. Although, thats why Google is trying to fix this problem after going after IOS all these years.

Android is just running on top of a Java VM. As long as its not capable to run on its own, it wont be as optimized as a pure Linux based OSes like Meego or Tizen or even Jolla..Windows is way more optimized already than Android will ever be. Android went fast and built everything and now its working on fixing the foundations whereas Windows Phone built a better foundation first and now its working on its way up.

what does a wallpaper do for you anyway..for your kind information windows phone is multitasking and more optimised..
And you are getting it wrong..Low end WP8 gives the same user experience as High end WP8..It doesn't mean WP8 is bad..u need to hav a good sense of humor..
What the hell do you mean by crappy features..You are jst jealous bcz WP8 has some great features..

512MB RAM maybe enough at first but after installing fifty or so apps, a dozen of it will pile needlessly at autostart during bootup. Worse it that some will persist to load even after using a software to dissable them.

Android has auto-killed apps not running in order to free up RAM for years now. While I doubt you'd be able to play high end games with 512MB of RAM, your phone will still work for a multitude of applications so this is a win for many.

You have to figure that a lot of people running devices with 512 MB devices are not power users. They are typically consumers that maybe playing Angry Birds and have a couple of productivity apps, and that's about it. My in-laws have a couple of low end devices, they don't do a whole lot with them other than text and make calls.

Users need choice. That's how industries innovate. That's how industries stay competitive. You need Apple to exist and you need people to use it. Even if you don't see it or like it. There is no reason to bash an OS in the way that you have.

25.ilia1986 (unregistered)

Android IS choice. There is more than enough competition within Android as it is between different OEM software customization options. There is no actual need for an arrogant, close minded company like apple to have an enslaving ecosystem for innovation to exist.

"Android is choice.." what's there to choose if Android is the only OS.? without competition it'll be a monopoly and that means Google does what they like, when they feel like doing instead of providing frequent updates like now. Don't be so closed minded and arrogant bro..

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